Reviews of 'Trail of the Black Wyrm'

Rating:

Trail of the Black Wyrm is the second book in the new Dragaonlance trilogy titled, The Taladas Trilogy. This new trilogy takes place on Krynn, but on a totally different continent than has been explored before. I for one hope many more novels are written about Taladas.

Fans of Dragonlance will notice fairly early in this book that this is Dragonlance in a whole new way. The gloves are off in Taladas. This world is dark and filled with grit and death. It truly seems like Pierson was given a lot more leeway to do the things he wanted to, in the way he wanted to.

The plot of this book carries over from the first book, Blades of the Tiger. In this book we deal with a converging of two separate plot lines, Barreth trying to find his wife and un-born son, and the 'Hooded One' trying to come to power. Both pieces of the plot are flawlessly written. They are succinct, tight, well written, and genuinely entertaining. There are some scenes in this book that I was shocked to see in a Dragonlance book. This novel moves along at a breakneck pace as well. There is very little sitting around and virtually no fluff. Pierson does a marvelous job at describing Taladas without going overboard. Truly a joy to read.

The characters of this book are not the two dimensional cut outs that one has come to expect from Dragonlance novels. Nor are they the ultra powerful, nothing can stop them heroes of some fantasy authors out there today. Each of the characters has self doubt and other problems that they carry throughout the book. The characters are also likeable which allows the reader to invest more energy in wanting them to succeed. There were some truly memorable moments in this book that I can't share because they are spoilers, but these are great characters.

Some middle novels of trilogies are not very well done and obviously just a book to get the reader to the third installment. I didn't feel that was the case with this book. I will say that if you are thinking of reading this book make sure you read the first one first, otherwise you will quickly be lost in what is going on and not understanding some of the plot points.

All in all this is a fantastic edition to the Dragonlance universe and one I will continue to read. I only hope that all future Taladas books are allowed the same grittiness that this series has been granted. This is the infusion of story that Dragonlance has needed for the last couple years. Great read!

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